Making Connections

Your network is your net worth

The water surrounding Farlo was always uncomfortably hot and acrid. If you got too close, your skin would start to boil. So, he cast his stone lessons down from that strange home atop his broken pillar and gazed benevolently on visitors. His life’s work was devoted to ceaselessly chiseling these cryptic tablets. Like most of The Lost, Farlo was once human, or something near enough to it. Possessed of lungs and gills, he could still survive Above, but he rarely ventured to the surface. His legs no longer functioned, though his twin tails worked just as well on land as at sea. Always willing to entertain the young with magic tricks and tall tales, he was beloved by the community, and was an old friend of Hungo’s.

- Tales of the Lost -

Look at that, two posts in a month! I am slowly getting caught up on this dungeon and that feels good. At this point though, I’m past the initial six month outline/superstructure I had envisioned. As expected, this will need to be redrawn, and I need to decide how the bottom half of the dungeon will be organized. I knew this would happen, of course. I’m reminding myself constantly that this is a rough draft and a writing and design exercise. I’ve just started to go back to Level 1 and trace all the room connections on a flowchart to help me keep track of this as I revise and annotate earlier sections. Seven rooms per page in my notebook is a good format for writing, but it makes keeping track of megadungeon connections tricky. I find it’s important to have multiple paths through each level and multiple ways to get to and from specific locations. This is especially true in a dungeon that is constantly shifting and changing. Some areas will only be accessible to PCs with special gear or abilities, shared knowledge, or permission from some faction or NPC. However, there should always be some way forward (or sideways or down, as is most often the case.) I won’t guarantee you can always go backwards. Here you can see my initial layout plan…loosely devised in the days before the daily challenge began, as well as all the connections on Level 1 and just a bit of Level 2. I like this flowchart/mindmap tool, and I think I need to do something similar for NPC and faction connections. Make sure to put a bold arrow between Hot Farlo and the wily bandit chief.

Okay, on to the weekly maps. Hopefully, the blogging will get caught up with the dungeon design in a few months. For now, you get four weeks!

Week 11: Back in March, I got bored with the planner format. As I think about all the RPG maps and books I love the most, I like things that are different. I like text in the margins, I like non-linear layouts and secret notes. I always like to throw tiny hidden details in my illustrations and maps. Embracing the roughness of this draft, I took a few weeks to experiment. The first one was not as effective as I’d like, but it’s definitely an idea I’d like to explore. Here we can see one portion of the underwater village of The Lost. Everything here should feel familiar in the way that an “RPG Village” operates, but also be visually and culturally alien.

 

Week 12: A better implementation of this format. I like the freedom it gives me to map. It still doesn’t really make sense with this notebook. One thing I’ve learned is how much I still just love a dotted grid the most. This section of the village is where one will find Hot Farlo and his dubious wisdoms. The image at the top of this post is just a sketch to keep me drawing, but it’s also one of the first times I’ve put much thought into one of the dungeon’s NPCs. It’s a good start, I don’t like his face, but it’s got me thinking a lot more about what exactly his deal is. This section also features a couple of strange dungeon phenomena and a giant fish skeleton

Week 13: The last bit of this level extends out into open ocean. (Note: I guess this is the first time that becomes possible, and will be a major revelation to the PCs.) Although it is protected by a physical barrier, it is not uncommon for hungry predators to get into the village and cause trouble. An ancient lifeform of strange origin tends a garden of worlds, and a strong current will carry you on a one way journey to Level 5: The Floating Gardens. There’s so much to describe here in such limited words. I have a long list of illustrations and handouts to help visualize the space when I revisit this. The beginning of April brings a new, more traditional dungeon layout, with plenty of secrets and traps, and a new type of enemy, deadly and devout.

Week 14: Digging into April for real. Tangled waterways give way to an intriguing series of rooms above the water level. A swiftly flowing underground river loops through the whole area, and surprises may appear suddenly if care is not taken. Plenty of hazards, both natural and handmade. More hints of advanced technology and superior intelligence are apparent here. Looking back, I find this section less appealing visually. For the sake of the writing process and keeping things moving, I still haven’t settled on a distinct dungeon “style.” Even when doing paid map work, I change it up from project to project, and that keeps things interesting. This project may be too large to give the level of detail I like to put into a map normally, so I’m not sure yet how the final version will look.

This post has been converted from a previous Substack post and dated accordingly. Please let me know if it seems like something got lost or if you find any major formatting issues

That’s all for now, I hope to have more for you in a couple weeks. As always, please share and subscribe if you’re into that! Questions and comments are welcome.

Andy